Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Pears are definitely a dime a dozen in Dubai at the moment so when I had family over for dinner last week, I knew I wanted to make a pear based dessert. Off I went to look through my favourites and found not one but two recipes featuring pears. Since I loved the topping of one and the filling of the other, I combined the two to come up with this striking pear and almond cake. Pears and almonds just have a natural affinity to one another eh........

This souffle type cake is great as it can be prepared in advance and served cold but if you prefer a hot dessert, go ahead and serve it straight out of the oven. The texture is best descibed by Tartelette as part cake, part custard and part souffle. The cake can also be made gluten free by substituting all purpose flour with sorghum flour.

This will store well in the fridge covered for up to several days. I only had two slices left but I felt it somehow tasted even better the next day- almost as though the almond flavour had intensified, the fruit was chewier and the cake denser!

This cake is great for a cold winter night- there's just something about apples and pears that make you feel all warm and fuzzy don't you think? We served this cold with a drizzle of custard, although you can also serve with a dollop of cream.

Pear and Almond Cake

Ingredients:

2 Anjou pears (peeled cored and sliced)

1/4 cup sugar

4 tbs water

3 tbs butter, room temperature
1/2 cup sugar

2 eggs

1 tsp pure vanilla extract

3/4 cup heavy cream

3/4 cup ground almonds

1/2 cup flour

1 tsp baking powder

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 175 degrees Centigrade. Grease and flour an 8 inch pan. Arrange pear slices in a uniform fashion at the bottom of your cake pan. Heat sugar and water in a saucepan without stirring. You can swirl the pan to aid in mixing until a light amber color is achieved. Don't overcaramelise as this will make the topping hard and bitter. Pour this topping evenly over pears.

Using the paddle attachment on your stand mixer and at medium speed, beat the sugar and butter until light and creamy. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition and scraping the bowl when needed. Reduce the speed to low and add the rest of the ingredients. Pour batter over the pears and bake for approximately 30 minutes. The skewer will come out almost clean when done.

Let the cake stand for 5- 10 minutes on a rack and say a prayer before turning it out. This recipe will serve 12 people.

We made this for some family friends last night and it was fantastic! Making the caramel was a bit of a disaster and the cake didn't look as beautiful as in your photos, but it came out wonderfully- very moist with great flavors. Thanks for sharing!

Hey there.....glad it turned out ok and everyone liked it. Making caramel indeed is a bit of hit and miss for me as well. One trick that helps me is that I never stir the mixture and rather, just swirl the pan. APPARENTLY it helps!

I just made this for friends for a Friday night dinner and it was delicious. My husband even raved that it wasn't overly sweet which I like because he doesn't eat very sweet desserts. Thank you for this recipe- it's a Fall/Winter recipe keeper

Delicious! Moist but light. I live in California's central valley and my local produce stand has bags and bags of pears. Since we couldn't eat them all, they are overly ripe and this recipe put them to good use. I used whole wheat flour instead of white and it is so good (can't tell it's wheat!) and used 1/2 vanilla & 1/2 almond extract since I just ran out of vanilla. So good! Thanks for this quick, delicious recipe using riped fruit!

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